Ranchi: Former union minister Subodh Kant Sahay on Saturday expressed grief at the death of 86-year-old Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray in Mumbai.

"The country has lost a successful political leader. Bal Thackeray had established a separate identity in politics of the country and people will remember him...," the Congress leader said in a press release here.

Condoling the cartoonist's death, BJP's state unit president Dineshanand Goswami said the void caused by Thackeray's death left an irreparable loss.

The Rastriya Jan Parishad head, Prem Kataruka said "Bal Thackeray was a great nationalist leader..."